Close Quarters

by Adrian Magson

  ‘Travis, this is your only chance of getting out of here in one piece. So move. Follow me and don’t ask questions.’

  Of course he couldn’t do both; that would have been too much to expect. ‘Who are you?’ he yelped, staring at the soldier rolling around in his seat. But at least he was moving while he said it, climbing out of the back seat like his pants were on fire.

  I checked out the army truck. It was too far away to see any detail, but I got the impression the figure in the passenger seat was staring at me and mouthing something.

  Oh-oh.

  Commotion. Lots of it. I heard the tailgate of the truck slam down, and two men appeared, unslinging automatic rifles. Time to rock and roll. I stepped out into the road where they could see me, lifting the Ero towards them. Soldiers know the dangers in facing a fully automatic weapon, and that standing up against one fitted with an extended magazine is like being in a duck shoot. The men fell back out of sight and the front-seat passenger disappeared below the level of the dashboard. But I wasn’t about to squirt the full load. Instead I fired three careful shots at the truck’s radiator. Engine blocks will stop all but armour-piercing shells, but they will take some damage in doing so. One of the shots must have punched the release mechanism, because suddenly the hood flew up and they were flying blind.

  It was all the advantage I was going to get. I turned and put a bullet into the engine of the jeep and shouted, ‘Come on,’ grabbing Travis by the arm and hustling him back through the front door into the building.

  I could hear the sound of boots pounding down the stairs and a voice yelling instructions in the background. Grey Suit was pissed at finding nobody home and was now wondering what the hell was happening outside. We had seconds to get away from here. I pushed Travis towards the back door and waited for the telltale clatter of boots on the stairs, then stepped out and fired two shots into the wall. Chunks of plaster rained down and the soldier coming down swore and scrambled back the way he’d come.

  As we ran down the path to the door at the rear, we passed the man I’d hit coming in. He was rolling around in a daze but still out of it. I ignored him and led the way out into the back run and across to the car. Things were in danger of hotting up; I could hear Grey Suit screaming for the troops in the truck and calling for the area to be sealed off.

  I headed west. I had a rough idea of how to get to Vokzal’na Square, and hoped the troops weren’t organized enough to be able to close down the entire area west of the city before we got out of here.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Travis said at last. He kept looking at me as though I’d landed from a spacecraft, which, considering he’d just been pulled out of a threatening situation, was no surprise. ‘Who the hell are you?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter who I am,’ I told him, and handed him my cell phone. ‘Call up Vokzal’na Square on the map; we need to get there double quick if you want to get home in one piece.’

  He finally figured out that his options were limited and clamped his mouth shut. He fed in the name and gave me directions, and we drove without speaking other than to confirm our route.

  Eventually I had to ask him the big question. ‘Did you tell them the address?’

  ‘What?’ He seemed surprised, even stunned, that I’d asked. Then he homed in on my accent. ‘You’re American. Are there more of you?’

  ‘The address of the cut-out,’ I repeated. I prodded him on the arm to focus his mind, narrowly missing being sideswiped by a small truck careering out of a side street without looking. ‘Did you give the man in the grey suit that address? This is serious.’

  ‘Wha— No! I didn’t. Christ, why would I do that?’

  He sounded sincere and I believed him. But I wished I didn’t. Because it left me wondering whether the SMS from Travis’s bosses had been picked up and read by the authorities, or if there was another leak along the line. I believe in things occurring at random, but some events are simply too remote to fall into that category. People die randomly, but not always. Buildings catch fire for no reason, but some get a bit of help along the way. Secrets sometimes fall into the open air by chance. But not always.

  ‘Did you keep the address on your cell phone?’ His cell had been confiscated; another source of leakage.

  ‘No. I committed it to memory and wiped it. I was with Military Intelligence – I know the rules.’ He sounded offended at the implication that he’d been careless and I figured that with his kind of military background he would know more about being in a sensitive zone than most ordinary grunts.

  Vokzal’na Square was a travel hub for the people of Donetsk, with trains, trams and buses all arriving in and leaving from there. The square itself, with the station at the far end, was wide open and spacious, with the road looping in and out like the eye of a needle and stops for trams and buses dotted around the outside perimeter. It boasted a handful of simple shops and eating places, and a brilliant white church with golden domes. It also had a lot of people standing around like refugees, waiting for their transport. But I spotted 24d immediately, a frail figure with a bucket-load of courage huddled under an advertising hoarding. He seemed to be alone and clear but I drove round twice before I was satisfied the area was secure.

  ‘This is where you get out,’ I told Travis, pulling into the side. I pointed at 24d, who had already spotted us. ‘Go with that man. He’ll hand you over to the next in line. You were briefed on the use of cut-outs. You know what their job is, right?’

  He nodded. He seemed calm enough, if a little pale. But the fact was, in spite of any past military service, he was now a desk man and what he’d been through must have seemed like the beginnings of a nightmare. He hadn’t said much since I’d grilled him about the address, and I was hoping it was his training keeping his questions and emotions in check. If he was about to freak out, it was better if he did it now while I had him under my control. I wasn’t sure 24d, who had massive problems of his own ahead of him, would be able to handle that, nor could I expect him to do so.

  ‘Where will I be going?’ was all he said.

  ‘Down the line. I’ll be monitoring your progress, so just do what you’re instructed to by the cut-outs, stay off the phone, even if you think it’s safe to call, and you’ll be home in time for tea.’ It wasn’t quite as simple as that, which he would have known by now, but it seemed something nice to aim for.

  ‘Why can’t you take me? You’re here; we could simply head out of the country. It’s safer heading west, isn’t it? We could just drive out.’

  He was right. We could do that. But if we ran into trouble we’d be sunk. Two Americans being caught up in this kind of volatile situation wasn’t something Callahan or his bosses would be able to explain away. Travis at least had the veneer of being a State Department envoy, which might give him some small measure of protection after all the arguing and political point-scoring over why he had come in was done. But my role wasn’t so easily brushed off. Worse, it would reflect badly on him.

  ‘We have to do it this way,’ I told him. ‘I’ll be watching your back, don’t worry.’

  He didn’t look convinced, but he thanked me and got out of the car. I watched him approach 24d and shake hands. Then the two of them turned and walked over to a black battle-scarred VW Polo with a bumble-bee sticker on the rear window and climbed in.

  I followed the Polo out of the square and called Langley. 24d was probably heading for the M04 road leading west to Pavlohrad, which was where Travis would be handed over to his next in line. If they didn’t run into trouble from the various separatists or Ukrainian military they should be fine, but there were never any guarantees in this game.

  ‘Travis is out, clear and on his way,’ I said, when the woman answered. ‘I’ll call again later.’

  ‘Understood, Watchman.’ She clicked off without further comment and I realized I didn’t yet know her name. Maybe now I never would.

  Because I suddenly realized I was being followed.

  NINETEEN

&nb
sp; I stayed on course while checking the vehicles behind me. It’s not as easy to do as they make out in films, especially on crowded streets with shifting traffic. It’s as much a process of identifying a specific vehicle as gut feel, but I was certain I hadn’t picked up a tail after leaving Obluskva Street; the roads out of there had been too quiet and I’d have spotted a car hanging on to me for too long. But when my antennae started quivering as soon as I drove out of Vokzal’na Square and turned south, I couldn’t ignore the warning.

  I must have been spotted at random; it was the only thing I could think of. And if that had come down to somebody trawling the streets for a red Toyota Land Cruiser, I figured it had to be Ivkanoy or one of his men.

  You read a lot about checking a tail by making a series of turns, doubling back, varying your speed and hoping the other driver makes a mistake and blows his cover. Mostly all you do is warn your follower that you’re on to him. I didn’t want that; I wanted to identify whether they were actually interested in me or had latched on to 24d and the black Polo.

  If it was me, I could handle it. It would be inconvenient but not a drama. If it was 24d they wanted, it was official. All they had to do was sit on his tail and keep radio contact with other units and they’d have Travis in the bag at their own time and place of choosing.

  Either way I had to take them out in some way. It meant not being able to keep tabs on the Polo, but I knew where 24d was taking him and as long as he didn’t make a wrong turn or get lost or picked up by security police or a stray militia group, I could catch up with him later.

  Losing sight of the man I was here to protect was far from ideal, but it was a risk I had to take before we went any further.

  Identifying the tail was a process of elimination, discounting each vehicle as it turned off or stopped until it came down to three possibles: a dark sedan with a roof aerial, a small blue Datsun and a scrubby-looking white Isuzu with an extended cab. Any one of them could be a surveillance unit, but I had to find out which one and who they were following: me or the Polo? I slowed down, allowing the Polo to get some way ahead, then braked and hung a right at an intersection, making like an out-of-towner checking addresses and street numbers while keeping an eye on my rear-view mirror.

  The sedan, Datsun and Isuzu came with me. So I was the target.

  I put my money on the sedan with the aerial. Aerials mean cops or security police. Was this Toyota hot after all? Did Ivkanoy have some juice with the local police department and they’d put out an all-points watch for the car? Or was I about to be stopped by security police working on a hunch?

  After a couple of turns the Datsun was gone. One down, two to go.

  Two more turns and the sedan and the Isuzu were still there. The sedan had two men in the front, both stony-faced, solid, dressed in shirts and ties. To me they had the look of cops. I couldn’t make out the Isuzu but it looked as if it contained just the driver.

  I headed out towards the south-western suburbs and the H15 road. The sooner I got out of Donetsk the better. Quite apart from my follower, the possibility of Ivkanoy and his cue-wielding pal being on the lookout for the car and my skin, and the risk of running into inquisitive or jumpy militiamen, was too great. I’d already seen too many light military vehicles and APCs – armoured personnel carriers – stationed at junctions, and it seemed evident that a serious situation was brewing and about ready to explode.

  The H15 looped south out of the city and was an alternative route to Pavlohrad. It was a two-lane highway bordered by twin lines of trees, and had an ageing, pitted surface that forced drivers out towards the centre line. It would take longer to reach Pavlohrad than the northern M04 road, which 24d and Travis were taking, but it would allow me more time and space to watch my back and look out for trouble ahead.

  And to ditch the trouble coming up behind.

  I drove for twenty minutes, frog-hopping lumbering trucks and ratty old cars, with the sedan and the Isuzu never far behind. I occasionally put on a burst of speed but didn’t make enough headway to lose them completely without making it obvious.

  The traffic was mostly military or haulage, with a sprinkling of private cars and pickups. A troop carrier came blasting up behind, spreading exhaust smoke and shouldering its way through by sheer size and velocity. I let it go by. An old Range Rover decided to follow, overtaking on a suicide course and earning an angry blast from the Isuzu, before pulling in right behind me. It was full of kids with spiky hair and face jewellery, and they looked like they were having too much of a ball to care. I let them go, too. Somewhere in the mix of engines when we got bunched up close I could hear the raspy roar of a holed muffler.

  The troop carrier ahead of me signalled right and I saw the sign to a truck-stop ahead. It was time to push the envelope. It was a risky strategy but I was pretty sure if the guys behind me were friends of Ivkanoy and had plans to take me out, they wouldn’t do it in front of a bunch of armed soldiers.

  If they were official, and had already got my number, then it wouldn’t make any difference.

  I followed the troop carrier in and parked at the side of the building and waited. I watched the sedan go on by. The passenger turned his head to look, but not at me. The Isuzu followed, the muffler noise going with him, but the driver was intent on the road.

  I checked the café, which was busy, and went inside. I needed to get some food while I had the chance, and to see if anybody took an interest in the car.

  The other customers were hunched over their plates, intent on their meals and getting back out on the road, truckers and co-drivers with a job to do and schedules to meet. The situation to the east had cast a cloud over everyone no matter where they were, and was inevitably affecting non-essential movements. That could be a problem if any local cops took an interest in non-military or non-haulage travellers, and gave me another reason to stay off the main roads as much as I could. I went back to the car and called up an app of the area on my cell phone to check the alternatives.

  They were few in number. Other than the road I was on, there was the mirror route to the north – the M04 to Pavlohrad – with a thin network of roads and tracks connecting the two across an open expanse of fields, rolling hills, lakes and rough terrain.

  I checked I had plenty of fuel and decided to take off. Three miles down the road I took a right turn and found myself on an unmarked metalled surface heading directly north into open country. If my map was accurate, this would lead eventually to the M04. If I didn’t like the look of that I could turn left and burrow deeper into the countryside until I reached Pavlohrad on back roads.

  The houses or farms were few in number and scattered; low, small structures on plots surrounded by crumbling walls or wooden picket fences, it was like stepping back in time. I saw a couple of old people, mostly weather-worn and stooped, who watched me go by without expression, but that was it.

  After an hour of rough, potholed road, I came up and over an escarpment dotted with a few straggly trees and saw the ground ahead drop away in front of me like diving off a cliff. I stamped on the brakes.

  Doesn’t matter who you are, in this game you don’t go over a brow in unknown terrain without first checking your route is clear.

  Once I’d made sure there were no surprises waiting for me on the other side, I got back in and began a long ride downhill. The road was narrow here, bordered either side by rough ground and rocks, with overgrown gullies where old river courses had carved their way through the earth from the higher ground.

  As I picked up speed, I heard a loud bang and my world went crazy.

  TWENTY

  I came to after a few seconds and found I was hanging upside down with the seat belt across my throat, slowly choking me. The interior of the car was clouded with dust from the airbag, and I could smell fuel in the air and the sourness of ingrained car dirt, and my mouth was gritty with God knew what accumulated crap thrown off the floor. I braced myself with one hand on the roof and pushed the belt release catch, rolling into
a ball to cushion my impact. I kicked hard at the driver’s door, which was partially open. No go. It was wedged tight with a screen of coarse grass and dirt flattened against the outside of the glass.

  I squirrelled round and looked through the windscreen. The view wasn’t great, and starred with a crazy network of cracks. I breathed deeply, fighting back a sense of panic. If the bang I’d heard was a tyre being shot out, and I couldn’t get out right now, I was in deep trouble.

  I forced myself to apply cool logic. There was no way anybody could have got into a position ahead of me to shoot out a tyre this soon. They wouldn’t have known I was going to take this route because until I saw it, even I didn’t know. And if I had been shot at, there would have most likely been at least one follow-up shot to make sure of a kill. So far there hadn’t been any.

  That left a simple blow-out; one of those things that happens on rough country roads, the inevitable result of sharp stones meeting worn tyre walls. Circumstance and randomness coming together to play games with the best-laid plans.

  I found my overnight bag and checked my surroundings. I appeared to be in a gulley facing downhill. A fine mist was being blown from beneath the hood and ghosting across the cracked glass, feeding into the car through a couple of small holes. The smell raised the hairs on the back of my neck.

  Smoke.

  There was no way out through the front, so I checked the passenger door. It was badly buckled around the lock, but didn’t appear to have anything blocking my way out.

  I swivelled my hips and smashed both feet against the passenger window. It took three attempts in the cramped space, and I prayed the vibration against the door wouldn’t cause the side pillar to buckle and collapse. The glass finally blew out with a crash and I followed fast, dragging myself through the hole and up the side of the car to the rear, where I rolled clear.